Business software-maker Compuware believes that the model-driven pattern-based (MDPB) approach to Web services development will bridge what it calls a J2EE skills gap.

To that end, the Detroit-based company released its OptimalJ development platform along with its MDPB approach.

Company officials called MDPB structured to enable developers to deliver applications faster and more efficiently, saying the approach makes use of patterns to automatically translate business models into working applications.

Dan Schoenbaum, vice president of strategy for the company, said the MDPB development environment enables companies to overcome the biggest J2EE challenge: productivity with limited resources.

"As more and more of our customers realize they need some form of automation to close the J2EE skills gap, we are seeing MDPB development mature past the early adoption phase," he said in a statement.

The company said Web Services Security is also improved in the latest OptimalJ release, which also supports the latest published OASIS (Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards) WS-Security specifications.

The OASIS security specification is intended to ensure a secure Web service implementation. Compuware claims to be the first vendor with a model-driven tool to support the WS-Security specification.

OASIS recently formed an XRI Data Interchange (XDI) committee
to define new specifications for sharing trusted and secure XML documents across multiple domains.

The OptimalJ 1.3 release is also intended to be easier to deploy and test allowing for integrated testing on both IBM WebSphere and BEA WebLogic Server, as well as provide support for legacy integration. Compuware has a partnership with BEA that integrates OptimalJ with BEA's WebLogic Workshop.

Compuware said integration with UML modeling tools and industry standard tools such as IBM's Rational Rose have also been improved in this release.

Compuware is a member of the Java Tools Community (JTC), led by Sun Microsystems and formed at the beginning of 2004 as an alternative to the IBM-led Java-based open source tools project known as Eclipse.

Compuware recently acquired auto-industry play Covisint, which further expands the customer base for its products.